THE QUIREBOYS + TROY REDFERN – CONCORDE 2, BRIGHTON 21.1.22
It’s bitterly cold outside the wonderful Concorde 2 tonight, but luckily there’s a double banger of a bill to warm the cockles.
First to hit the stage at 7pm is the down and dirty sounds of Troy Redfern and his band, an explosive three-piece consisting of Troy Redfern (guitar and vocals, Kiera Kenworthy (bass) and Finn McAuley (drums).
Straight from the off, this band grabs me and doesn’t let go until they ring out the last notes of their cover of ‘Voodoo Chile’ in the all too short six-song set. Opener ‘Scorpio’ kicks you in the teeth with its mean and dirty riff, whilst ‘Love And War’ is a real groover with a thumping bassline, catchy chorus and electrifying solo. The other songs in the set are no slouches, but the highlight for me is ‘Waiting For Your Love’, with Troy Redfern wringing the life and soul out of his instrument with some beautiful slide guitar.
If you like your hard rock down and dirty, infused with the blues and with some explosive slide guitar, check out Troy Redfern live or grab his latest album, ‘The Fire Cosmic’. It’ll melt your record deck. Definitely a band I’ll see again and again.
Find out more at troyredfern.com
It’s been two years coming, but finally, The Quireboys get to hit the stage at Brighton’s Concorde 2 for the 30th anniversary of their seminal LP ‘A Bit Of What You Fancy’, which hit the charts at number 2 on its release back in 1990 launching the band skywards in the process. Tours with Guns ‘N’ Roses and The Rolling Stones followed, and they filled venues up and down the country as the fans partied to their gipsy rock n roll vibes.
It’s now 32 years later, and apart from the band splitting up in 1993, they’ve been pretty active since 2001 with a fantastic new lineup with the heart and soul of the Quireboys, Spike and Guy Griffin, remaining steadfast.
So how does Quireboys 2022 compare to way back then? Well, pretty damn good, to put it mildly, as they prove straight away as they burst into opener ‘I Love This Dirty Town’, a real honky tonk rocker from the ‘Homewreckers And Heartbreakers’ album from 2015.
The set, as you would imagine, leans heavily on the ‘A Bit Of What You Fancy’ album, so it’s a sing-a-long party all the way as we are treated to classic after classic, all delivered with those gravel tone vocals of the cheeky Geordie frontman. Spike’s voice has matured much like a fine whiskey, and whether it’s put to the test on the wild and rockin’ ‘Hey You’ or the sweet refrains of ‘Take Me Home’ or ‘Roses And Rings’, he nails it every time.
Highlights come thick and fast, the beautiful ‘I Don’t Love You Anymore’, a bourbon-soaked ballad that has stood the test of time with the band taking it to its max. ‘There She Goes Again’ gets the crowd going, and the tinkling ivories that herald the start of ‘7 O’clock’ receives the best reaction of the night so far, with everyone joining in on that classic chorus and those woo-hoo yeah’s! It’s a great way to end the main set.
The band returned for a cracking encore of old and new tunes finishing off with a banging duo of ‘This Is Rock ‘n’ Roll’. Then we all get invited to a ‘Sex Party’, which raises the temperature and the roof and is sure to please one punter at the front who has been screaming for it the whole damn night.
The Quireboys yet again prove that they still know how to throw a rock ‘n’ roll party with the best of them, and they are a band still at the top of their game, and they’ve not even peaked yet. This band should be heralded as a national treasure, but unfortunately, I don’t believe they get the credit they rightfully deserve outside of their loving fan base, which is a damn shame. Spike is my generation’s Rod Stewart and the band, the missing link between The Faces and Aerosmith.
If you want a rock ‘n’ roll party, then The Quireboys are damn well it!
The Quireboys setlist:
‘I Love This Dirty Town’
‘Misled’
‘Man On The Loose’
‘Hey You’
‘There She Goes Again’
‘Whippin’ Boy’
‘Long Time Comin’’
‘Roses & Rings’
‘I Don’t Love You Anymore’
‘Sweet Mary Ann’
‘Take Me Home’
‘7 O’Clock’
(encore)
‘Mona Lisa Smiled’
‘Original Black Eyed Son’
‘This Is Rock ‘n’ Roll’
‘Sex Party’
Find out more at quireboys.com
